


Lang Du Sang

by IvanaeSilvia



Category: Hannibal (TV), Hannibal Lecter Series - All Media Types
Genre: Beau Graham looks like Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Beau had never raped Will and he will never do it, Buuut this is a twisted/dark fanfiction anyway, Daddy Issues, Implied/Referenced Incest, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, M/M, Manipulative Hannibal, Possessive Hannibal, Rape and Incest are the main topics but there's nothing described, So it's about rape/incest talking, Talking, They talk a lot, talk talk talk, this is really fucked up
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-23
Updated: 2017-08-24
Packaged: 2018-11-18 01:21:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 5
Words: 10,772
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11280780
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IvanaeSilvia/pseuds/IvanaeSilvia
Summary: It had been exactly seven minutes since Will Graham had exited through that door, leaving behind him a trail of a horrible aftershave, and interesting confessions.He knew very well who was behind that loud, rude request for access, yet he found he was still surprised by such audacity (...). Contrasting sharply with the elegant décor of the small room, there was a tall, imposing man with wide shoulders and hands hidden in the front pockets of a pair of dark jeans, ruined by time and work.He wore a wide grey singlet, that revealed a pair of strong and slightly tanned arms that were dusted with thick black hair."Howdy, Doctor," Beau Graham said, with a creepy smile that displayed predator teeth as white and sharp as a wolf.--------------*** This story is based onPauvre Bêteby deafpool (castielsass).Read the notes at the beginning for reading. ***





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [deafpool (castielsass)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/castielsass/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Pauvre Bête](https://archiveofourown.org/works/9665456) by [castielsass](https://archiveofourown.org/users/castielsass/pseuds/castielsass). 



> This story is based on [Pauvre Bête](http://archiveofourown.org/works/9665456/chapters/21834455) by deafpool (castielsass).  
> So you must read that at first, at least the first three chapters.
> 
> This fanfic is a "what if" that takes place during between the third and fourth chapters.  
> There is written in the fourth chapter that "It took some days of following Beau for him to find the perfect boy".  
> So my work is based what could happen in those days.
> 
> *** A HUGE THANK YOU FOR THE AMAZING WRITER OF THAT STORY, WHO BETAD ME DESPITE THE COMMITMENTS.  
> I'm italian so he helps me A LOT.  
> Thanks you very much, dear <3\. You're awesome! ***

 

\---

 

Hannibal Lecter was sipping from a glass of excellent Château de Pibarnon when he heard knocking at the door. Three distinct bangs echoed through the waiting room connected to his office.  
Swiftly, he left the goblet on the circular glass table and rose to his feet. The liquid swirled in the glass, small swells of blood-red wine whirling inside. He checked his wristwatch, and then tucked it under the sleeve of his shirt, elegantly.    
It had been exactly seven minutes since Will Graham had exited through that door, leaving behind him a trail of a horrible aftershave, and interesting confessions.  
  
He knew very well who was behind that loud, rude request for access, yet he found he was still surprised by such audacity. He squeezed the lower button of his American walnut-coloured suit jacket, and had to restrain himself from bending his lips in a smile of mischief when he slid the door forward, revealing his unexpected guest.  
Contrasting sharply with the elegant décor of the small room, there was a tall, imposing man with wide shoulders and hands hidden in the front pockets of a pair of dark jeans, ruined by time and work.  
He wore a wide grey singlet, that revealed a pair of strong and slightly tanned arms that were dusted with thick black hair.  
  
  
"Howdy, Doctor," Beau Graham said, with a creepy smile that displayed predator teeth as white and sharp as a wolf. His beard was unkempt and greying, matching his short, disordered hair that curled just over his ears. Hannibal looked over the man, and watched him inflate his chest, as though he wanted to fill it with power and emphasize the slight size difference between them.  
Indifferent to such a primitive show of masculinity, Hannibal proffered his hand in a greeting, relaxing his exotic features in a mask of polite courtesy.  
  
“Mr Graham,” Hannibal said. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”  
  
Beau took Hannibal’s hand finally, shaking it with some force in a grim, but gratifyingly strong contest. His skin was hard, dry, his hands worked to callouses.  
  
“My son mentioned he was goin’ to therapy today,” Beau said as he watched Hannibal’s eyes. He tilted his head slightly, breathing from his nose deeply, as though he were searching for the appropriate words.  
  
"So,” Beau continued, finally. “I thought I should know his therapist. We only really saw each other for a few minutes, and I don't think it was enough to evaluate your professional skills, y’know? I want my baby to have the best of the best. You can understand that, right?”  
  
Hannibal restrained himself from pointing out that Will  was in his thirties. Instead, he opted for a neutral nod, as though he understood perfectly and agreed with such an absurd justification.  
  
"It seems to me more than right, Mr Graham. But please, do come in."  
  
Hannibal moved himself away from the door, leaving space for Beau to enter. As he did, Hannibal took the opportunity to observe the cross-shaped tattoo that decorated the inside of Beau's left forearm.  
He knew that Will's father had not come to attack him. Beau was a predator, much like Hannibal. He had come to examine the enemy territory, to explore a potential rival.  
  
Hannibal couldn't deny how intriguing it all was.  
  
"How did you find my-” Hannibal started, but Beau cut across him swiftly, guessing the end of his question. Hannibal pursed his lips slightly in irritation.  
  
"Oh, I followed my boy when he left home," Beau said, casually.  
  
Noisily, Beau approached the black armchair opposite to the one at which Hannibal usually sat. He bypassed the couch entirely, drawn to the single armchair as though by a magnet. Hannibal was not very surprised by this. He watched the man sink into the chair and inhale deeply through his nose. He had not asked where Will had sat, but closed his eyes, inhaling slowly.  
Hannibal decided it would be best to pretend that he hadn’t realized that Beau had recognized Will’s scent. Abruptly, he found himself repressing a shiver.  
  
“Has Will been comin’ to see you long?” Beau asked when he finally opened his eyes, his voice a loud, rude tone that tumbled around the closed room. Hannibal observed him for a moment before answering, slowly sitting down in front of him.  
  
Beau Graham was definitely different from his son.  
  
Unlike Will, who was elusive, always wandering around the room in a desperate attempt to escape from Hannibal's questions, Beau had his arms crossed over his broad chest, and he was still. Contrasting to Will, Beau’s pose was unmoving and virile, and he made eye-contact effortlessly.  
  
  
"Since he started to work for Jack Crawford. Alana Bloom recommend me as a doctor for his mental health. Jack, perhaps rightly, fears for Will's stability.”  
  
Beau's eyes narrowed briefly, as though he was reflecting on Hannibal’s words. He tapped his fingers fluently on his muscular elbow. Abruptly, he exhaled particularly heavy, almost as though he were exasperated.  
  
"Are you worried about him?"  
  
"He has a very precious mind. Agent Crawford counts on his empathic ability to solve the most... puzzling problems,” Hannibal said, neatly avoiding the question.  
  
Silence reigned for a few seconds, which Hannibal used to observe how Beau's facial muscles hardened, anger, confusion and realization flitting across his expression.  
  
"Have you ever been to a psychiatrist, Mr Graham?" Hannibal asked, eventually, inching closer to his true intention.  
  
Will's father came out of his trance state, shaking his head roughly like a wet dog.  
  
"I don't need anyone's help. I can look after myself. Been doin’ it long enough," Beau said, a note of bitterness heavy in his voice.  
  
"Don't see psychiatry necessarily as help. It could be a way to vent, to allow yourself mental relief… Have you ever wanted to take a weight off, or simply talk about something that torments you?” Hannibal asked politely, carefully.  
  
Beau's coffee-colored eyes were alight with a slight shimmer of pure and unique interest. He clenched his thin, dry lips for a moment, tilting his head as if he was trying to look inside Hannibal's skull.  
  
"You can't talk about everything that goes on in your head. Everyone has secrets, Doc,” Beau said.  
  
"Certainly ... in the outside world." Hannibal answered enigmatically, effortlessly returning Beau’s heavy and animalistic stare.  
  
Beau inclined his chin, showing the hard line of his neck, taking advantage of his stretch to reflect on those words.  
  
"Are you trying to tell me that I can say whatever the fuck I want, no consequences?"  
  
Hannibal restrained a disapproving grimace to his scurrilous language.  
  
"I am more like an outside listener. I'm not here to give any advice, unless it is explicitly requested, Mr Graham. “  
  
With the conversation now ended, Hannibal stood, and moved to place his glass of wine into the cupboard. One should never leave a drink in sight during a session. Beau Graham  followed him with his eyes, as thoughtful and careful as a hawk ready to attack.  
  
“Do you drink, Doctor?”  
  
He teased with pleasure, as if he wanted to discuss Hannibal’s professionalism. The blond man sighed softly, locking the cupboard's doors.  
  
"Not much. I enjoy some wine, occasionally, or at the end of a meal,” he informed Beau in a gentle tone, turning only after he fulfilling his task.  
Beau had not moved from the chair, but his arms were relaxed on either side, his legs were slightly apart. The pose vaguely reminded him of the one that Will often assumed.  
  
"I always did. Too much, Ella-May always said,"  
  
Beau admitted, scratching his chiseled chin, his eyes on Hannibal's face, but absent, thoughtful.  
  
"Ella-May?"  
  
Hannibal encouraged, in a soft tone. He approached very close to the seat with care, as if he was afraid to wake Beau up from a very deep and deserved sleep.  
Will's father seemed inclined to dialogue, perhaps because he had denied it for so long; but Hannibal remained prudent, deciding to approach him with caution.  
Mental opening could be a weakness and Hannibal would never waste such an opportunity.  
  
"My wife."  
  
Hannibal nodded to himself, though he had already realized who the woman was. But he had wanted to hear Beau’s voice, and examine the emotion behind his tone. Seeing him doing so peacefully was a good sign.  
He quietly waited for Beau to start a conversation and after a few seconds, the beast snorted nostalgically and started talking.  
  
"I met her when I was fifteen. She was the sweetest girl in the neighborhood ... lovely, delicate ... all the boys wanted her. But she liked me. She wanted me. She often said that I was as handsome as strong and courageous. She needed protection... she was so soft, y’know..."  
  
The image of a cute, tender young girl grows like a fresh green shot in Hannibal's mind. It was almost difficult to place her beside a man like Beau.  
The woman must have magnified the ego of her husband, encouraged his narcissism incessantly.  
  
"She was a weak, fragile person. But so sweet. Her parents weren’t happy when she chose to stay with me. Hell, when we got married,  God knows they preferred to listen to every other asshole in town about my “reputation”, instead of just fuckin’ asking me-"  
  
Beau seemed to cut himself off, frowning deeply as he rubbed a big hand over his scruffy face, lost in thought.  
  
"Reputation?"  
  
Hannibal spurred him, since his interest had grown significantly. Beau continued to watch him, this time more intensely, trying to hide what the doctor could almost miraculously define as discomfort.  
  
"People kept sayin' shit... like that I was a troublemaker, a bastard, a bully... that I touched on some girls without their consent. "  
  
"And that was true?"  
  
The doctor asked in a delicate and emphatic tone. Beau snorted out an irritating and nasal laugh, watching his fingers clenched on the armrest of the chair.  
  
"No - fuck, of course not! People incapable of defendin’ themselves, the weak ones … they always appreciate a bit of violence, a little bit of insistence. They want to feel desired, y’know? They want someone that takes care of them."  
  
This time, Hannibal decided not to confirm that absurd thought, as his mind jumped to a premature conclusion that arose from those words. So, instead he just tilted his head to make Beau understand that he was listening to him.  
And then, he decided to drop a dangerous, perhaps reckless, but fascinating bomb.  
  
"And tell me, Mr. Graham; is Will a weak person?"  
  
Beau's eyes were overwhelmed by an unmistakable shock, as though the question hit him hard.  
  
Their eyes clashed in a duel, a struggle between alphas.  
And in that gaze of fire and ice, Hannibal reluctantly had to admit that he saw a dangerous, powerful man, full of sadism, lust and anger.  
He saw an enemy.  
They both jolted out of their reveries when someone knocked at the door.  
Beau glanced up at the closed entrance, then he rested his eyes suspiciously on Hannibal's, narrowing them.  
  
"Are you expecting someone, doc?"  
  
Hannibal smiled faintly, a genuine gesture. Hannibal Lecter knew his patients very well.  
  
"I think it's for you, Mr. Graham."  
  
He stood up slowly, and calmly smoothed his jacket, heading to the door with false, easy indifference.  
Will, his hair slightly disordered, his cheeks burning with repressed anger, appeared on the doorstep. Hannibal heard the almost comic noise that accompanied Beau's abrupt rise.  
  
"Oh... darlin'. Are you looking for me?"  
  
Beau asked, literally purring, obviously enthusiastic about the idea that his son had come for him.  
Hannibal automatically moved away from Will, allowing him to approach while he carefully observed.  
Beau took a couple of quick steps forward, betraying his own emotion and Will’s response was beautiful, as he retreated immediately, opening his lips in a warning that died in birth.  
Beau watched Will’s face closely, while Will glanced from side to either side of his father's face, clenched a fist at his own chest as if he wanted to bump it on that broad thorax.  
On Beau’s face reigned a pure expression of sincere ecstasy. But on his son's face, fear and great discomfort lay bare.  
  
"Daddy ... what are you doing here? How did you find Hannibal's office?"  
  
The whole smile in Beau's face slowly disappearing, almost intimidating in its coldness.  
Hannibal flexed his right hand neatly, behind his back, readying himself to pounce if necessary.  
  
"Relax, kid... take it easy. Daddy just came to talk to your doctor,"  
  
Beau replied in an admonishing tone, staring at Will's face as if he wanted to burn it for asking such a bold question.  
Both Hannibal and Will started when Beau’s hand slipped out to grasp Will’s face, his thumb sliding along the hispid cheekbone and his fingertips immersed in the cascading curls of the young man.  
  
"Puppy, I just want to make sure that you have the best treatment possible,” Beau said firmly.   
  
That physical contact remained, while Will avoided Beau’s eyes, swallowing and shaking a little.  
A handful of seconds passed, resonating like stabs in Hannibal's chest.  
He wanted, quite abruptly, to tear apart the heart of that man, to bite it out directly from his chest.  
But he only stood motionless, watching the sad, intense spectacle, a groan of anger abolished in his throat.  
  
"Yeah,”

Will mumbled, taking the lower lip in his mouth to suck it, a gesture of obvious nervousness that he had to have learned from his adolescence.  
Beau's cold glance slipped on his lips for a moment, then back on his eyes and he finally let him go, ignoring how Will sighed in relieve sonorously.  
Hannibal finally decided to act, putting his hand on the boy's shoulder, comforting and relaxing, an innocent touch.  
The muscle was incredibly tense under his fingers.  
  
"I offered your father some psychiatric sessions. Gratis, obviously."  
  
Those words obtained the desired effect and Beau shifted his eyes to Hannibal, displaying his teeth in a not-particularly-encouraging smile, almost amused.  
  
"That I've decided to accept,” Beau interrupted. “It doesn't seem like a bad idea to chat with the same man that talks to my son, right baby?”  
  
"Yes, it's ...a good idea, I guess,"  
  
Will responded promptly, thoughtfully, looking at Hannibal with a tormented expression, but without fear. He didn't want to make his father angry, and he trusted Hannibal.  
He knew that Hannibal was smart enough to know how to act with a man like Beau.  
He also knew that his friend did it to help both of them and he feels almost selfish relief to take advantage of his offer.  
Maybe, he thought secretly, Hannibal could change things.  
Maybe... one day.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thank you deafpool, as always, for betad me.  
> You're a sweetheart.

It was much later than evening when Hannibal approached the Graham house. He took care to keep himself in the dark, hidden between the trees.  
He scrutinized the interior of the house: it was bare and dark in that small corner of lonely paradise. He found Will in the kitchen cutting meat, probably a beef shank, still smoky and soft.  
The dogs sit politely around him as though he were the sacrifice of a strange rite, with their muzzles pointed to their master and their tails shaking.  
Beau came downstairs as Hannibal watched.  
He wore a black t-shirt and the same pair of jeans that he had when he was in Hannibal's office.  
  
Beau hovered in the doorway, resting his left hand in the upper corner of the doorway, saying something in a low tone to his son. Will startled at his entrance, and listened as though he was distracted. With a frown on his face, Will nodded slowly, watching his father pick up keys from the living room and exiting through the front door.  
  
Now more clearly, Hannibal watched Beau pull out a cigarette from the carton in the back pocket of his jeans and light it, while he slipped into the car and started it up.  
Before following him, Hannibal spied behind the curtains a final time, and contemplated Will's beautiful face. as watched the front door, motionless, as his dogs clung desperately on his pants, barking and wriggling, eager to receive their meal.  
  
\---  
  
Beau passed his hands through his silvering hair, two, three, four and then five times, with the cigarette trailing smoke between his index and the middle fingers.  
He had his eyes closed, breathing slowly,  as if he was concentrating desperately. Getting ready to do something.  
Hannibal didn't want to understand Beau Graham, but still, at that moment in time, he knew exactly what he was thinking.  
But he knew.  
While Beau Graham pressed his forehead on the steering wheel, stopped in the parking lot of a vulgar bar for single men, Hannibal imagined he thought of soft, thick, chocolate hair, rebellious to the comb.  
He imagined that he would think of a pair of large, celestial eyes, cascade colored,  sweet features, a smooth, thin body, white like sand and soft like silk.  
A small mouth that attracts the gaze to itself, characterized by a lilac color, that seems it called for a kiss.  
He imagined a gentle, but tenacious boy with an eccentric and lonely personality, hiding a uniquely genius mind.  
He watched Beau raise his head, open the car door, and throw the cigarette on the ground (a gesture that caused in Hannibal a sense of sincere and unforgettable annoyance) with his hands in his pockets and an imposing stalk toward the bar.  
Hannibal knew that Beau Graham was thinking about his son.  
  
\---  
  
Beau came out a few minutes later from the front door, angry face painted with a snarl that uncovered his sharp teeth.  
He was followed by a young man, perhaps thirty, simple but graceful, visibly frustrated and perhaps even offended.  
The boy grabbed his arm without much strength, just to make him turn and talk, but Beau was furious.  
  
Beau turned his face toward the young man, and struck his face, so viciously that the poor victim fell onto the parking lot with a cry of pain.  
  
Hannibal watched the boy as he fell into a pool of light from the bar. While crying softly, he tried to staunch his bleeding nose with delicate, shaking hands. Quickly, his blue shirt soaked purple with his blood. His tight, adherent black pants left little to the imagination. Hannibal watched the boy sob with indifference; an angular face, platinum blonde hair, a pair of dark brown eyes.  
No doubt about it.  
Clearly, the boy was too unlike Will.  
  
\---  
  
A few minutes later, Hannibal preceded Beau to the house.  
He watched Will from behind the curtains, contemplated the slender figure and the sweet curves as he walked out from the bathroom, with only a pair of wet, white underpants. His own body was driven by a slight, hot shiver.  
Will had an almost hairless body, very harmonious, a delicate bone structure that highlighted its own pleasing shapes and his clear skin.  
Hannibal sighed in the silence of the night, admiring the lithe body, so different from his own, and certainly from his father's.  
In an unusual turn of sentiment, Hannibal hoped that this spectacle of freedom and intimacy would remain a memory for him alone.  
He imagined this pretty man in his own home, his hair wet, his domestic, peaceful air-  
His daydream was brutally broken by the rumbling of a car, which slid like a massive snake up the driveway, and parked in front of the house.  
From the car, Beau came out with the expression of one who had worked for the whole day and cannot wait to put his head on a pillow.  
  
Hannibal closed his eyes for a few seconds, breathing in full lungs and readying himself.  
He touched a little, sharp knife, buried in the inside of his brown jacket, watching carefully as Beau entered the house, throwing the keys on the couch.  
He prepared himself in case things degenerated.  
An excuse for Hannibal’s presence, if necessary, could be decided at a later time.  
Spying carefully, Hannibal sought out Will, hoping he was in his bedroom upstairs.  
But he wasn't.  
Instead, he stood in front of the open fridge, probably looking for a night snack, an absently thoughtful expression on his face, with a hand leaning against the top of the fridge and the other inside of it.  
  
As soon as Beau entered the kitchen, Hannibal held his breath, pressing his fingers tightly to the tree behind which he was hiding.  
It seemed that Will's father was doing the same, because he appeared literally petrified.  
Beau parted his dry lips, staring at the naked back of his son with sharp intensity, as though he were in a trance. Abruptly, then Winston, sitting beside Will's feet, began to bark in his direction, probably to warn his master about the newcomer.  
Apparently the young man was so lost in his thoughts that he had not heard his entrance.  
The boy glanced at the dog with a frown, and turned with a can of beer in his hand to look behind him.  
The can slipped from his hand, falling soundly on the floor, so loudly that Hannibal heard it from the outside of the house, over the sound of the crickets.  
It was very clear that Will had not expected Beau’s return so soon.  
But not to Beau.  
Beau seemed to be slightly flushed, almost euphoric.  
  
Positioned in this way, one facing the other, Will, almost naked, seemed very small compared to Beau, who was not only taller by several inches, but far wider, more intimidating.  
  
The following scene seemed to occur almost in slow motion.  
Will placed his hand on his own chest, as if he wanted to prevent an heart attack.  
His eyes shifted from the right shoulder to his father's nose as if he was struggling to look at him.  
Beau sighed so strongly that his chest deflated, and that confirmed to Hannibal that he was actually holding his breath.  
Finally, Will spoke and Hannibal tried to read his lips, gathering a phrase close to; “I didn’t expect you back so soon…”  
  
Beau, meanwhile, didn't stop looking at his son. His eyes lingered on his blushing face and his body, letting his frosty, slow, penetrating glance slip into Will like a medieval sword.  
Hannibal noticed that his fingers were writhing, as if he were dying with the want to put them on Will, to give him a slap, to take him, to smack him against the fridge- he had no idea.  
  
Will lowered himself to pick up the can and quickly, he threw it into the sink, eager to get into his bedroom. Beau approached him just when Will turned for a moment, and with a single step, Beau locked Will in between himself and the shelf.  
Will had the most beautiful expression, and his reaction of fear and discomfort was fascinating.  
For a brief moment, Hannibal even found himself envying Beau when the young man let out a surprised sigh when he turned around and found himself in front of Beau. He raised his eyes, meeting his father's for just a moment, his face twisted with shame and terror.  
Will pressed his own naked back against the counter, arching in fear, when Beau stretched out his arm. He touched his large, slightly shaking hand to the side of Will’s hair and then on his face. He licked over his own teeth, his smile slow and intense.  
He had his eyes half-closed, glued to the boy's face and he whispered something softly.  
Perhaps a nickname. Most likely "baby," or "darlin'".  
Will trembled so much that drops of water fell from his hair, breaking on his shoulders.  
When Beau's hand slipped slowly along his neck, and then to his shoulder, Will ducked him, and  sprinted to the right. His face downcast, he ran up the stairs. Breath slightly faster, influenced with rage and hate, Hannibal watched Beau, standing motionless in front of the sink with his hand still outstretched while Wilson clung to his legs to sniff him.  
  
\----  
  
“When I first found out Ella-May as pregnant, I’ll admit it. I thought havin’ a brat would be a fuckin’ problem,”  
  
Beau began, breaking the silence that had followed his entrance.  
He sat on the patient’s armchair, his eyes focused on his ruined shoes. He didn’t make eye contact, Hannibal noticed.  
Not because of discomfort, but rather to minimise the risk of becoming overwhelmed.  
Like father, like son.  
  
Hannibal kept a polite, if cold silence, awaiting a follow-up.  
  
“For a moment. Just a little while, I thought I’d tell her to abort it. I loved her. But we were poor. A baby would make things so hard. But it was just a moment. I thought about it, and right after I knew we were gonna be a family, no matter what.”  
  
His demeanor, his words inspired a brief, faint sense of respect in Hannibal. As swiftly as it had come, it left, imparting a deeper awareness of Beau’s character. Then, a small, nostalgic smile appeared on Beau’s face, a tiny gesture of sincere affection.  
  
“I remember when Will was born. He was so small, just this tiny little thing, and still so… alive. I was overcome with this...sense of wonder…”  
  
He reflected, at first aloud, and then quieter and quieter, trailing off.  
Hannibal caught Beau’s eyes, noting the intensity of his gaze.  
  
“The first thing I thought was that he looked just like a doll. The most expensive, incredible little doll. I said to myself, ‘I made this. Holy shit, this is mine, this perfect little thing. I made this’.”  
  
He rubbed his thumb softly on the armrest of his armchair, narrowing his eyes, his lips thinned. It was clear how Beau had been hit by Will, from the first time he saw him.  
Even if his intense love for Will then was different to how it manifested now, it was clear the man had always had a weakness for his son, always an abnormal sense of possession. Hannibal reflected on how both his and Beau’s future would have differed had Ella-May aborted.  
  
He found himself repressing a light shiver at the idea, what a waste it would be if someone like Will had never been born. Intense loneliness. He felt it like a fist in the face.  
  
“Being a father is so...strange, and satisfying. You see your kid, and you think ‘look at him. Do you believe this? God, I did this’.”  
  
Beau’s dreamy voice brought him back to earth, back to the conversation.  
  
He nodded slowly as Beau raised his gaze to him, and he watched Beau sigh and stretch his arms out in front of him with a rude groan.  
  
“When I held him for the first time, I promised myself. I’d make sure he grow strong, and healthy. I would teach him how to fish, and fight, and if he didn’t like school, then, fuck, I would teach him everything I knew. My wife and me, we take turns staying awake at night, ‘cause even as a baby, Will suffered from insomnia. It was devilishly hard to make him sleep. I had to memorise so many lullabies, just to make him fall asleep. My wife used to make fun of me, say I sounded more like a crow than a singer.”  
  
Beau’s sad laughter resounded in the room and he caught a tear from the corner of his right eye with his index knuckle.  
Hannibal observed that the smile on Beau's face disappeared flat, like dragged by a current, and how it was replaced with a serious and almost slightly disturbed expression.  
  
“Then,” Beau said. “Thirteen years after Will was born, Ella-May got sick.”  
  
Hannibal remained quiet, looking at his own hands. He rested them on his own knees, and didn’t press Beau to continue. When Beau resumed speaking, he seemed inclined to burst into tears.  
  
“I thought we had overcome everything, so this fucking thing wouldn’t take her. But it was something much stronger than her. And we couldn't do anything ... just ... just wait.”  
  
Beau swallowed a hiccup, rubbing his hand over his rough face as if he were trying to shake it off.  
He swallowed hard, closing his eyes for a minute, and when he sighed, he seemed to come back to himself, even though his lips and his jaw were clenched in pain.  
  
“Life goes on, I thought. I did so much to try accept that my wife would die sooner or later and I couldn't do anything, fuck.  Anything. So, with her agreement, I decided to focus on Will. I didn't want Ella-May's death to stop me being a father. It wasn't his fault she was dying…”  
  
Something in his voice dropped.  
Just for a second, just for a moment.  
Hannibal listens, and thinks.  
Beau is hiding something.  
He is an excellent actor, he could mask his own emotions effortlessly, and he had a talent of hiding secrets, misdirecting people from them.  
But so did Hannibal.  
  
Beau kept his silence, as though the words he wanted to voice were too heavy for him, too difficult to say, and Hannibal watched him. As he watched, he remembered the events of last night.  
  
A frightened Will Graham, who watched his father lock him in with his big body, stroking him as only a lover would have the right to do.  
He remembered the spasm of Will's mouth as their eyes met, the way he prettily blushed and trembled.  
  
But he also remembered Beau very well.  
Unfortunately.  
He had watched his son, the creature he had helped put into the world, with morbidness, with sick desire. He touched the skin of the boy who he had wanted so badly.  
Fighting with the urge to grasp a sharp pencil and plunge it into his strong neck, Hannibal searched Beau's eyes and he decided to test him.  
He challenged him to show his cards.  
Here, where no one else could hear.  
  
"Tell me about Will, Mr. Graham."  
  
  



	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was betad by my sweet and beautiful friend Alexandra and the awesome keleys from tumblr: http://keleys.tumblr.com/  
> Thank you very much! <3

"Will has always been such a quiet boy. Always alone, always silent.”,  
Beau Graham commented after a moment of silence, sighing loudly while remembering.  
  
He stared at Hannibal's eyes  
for several seconds without fluttering, as if he were reflecting on what to say or not to say.  
Whether to speak or not.  
But Hannibal knew that predators love to challenge each other, pushing each other to their limits.  
  
In fact, Beau cracked the knuckles of his fingers, physically preparing for his speech. The lamps lit up the office as the wind blew harder, swaying the trees and caressing the windows.  
  
"Ella-May often told me she thought that something was wrong with Will. She said he was...strange. I thought it was simply his nature and ignored her.”  
  
Hannibal noticed how quickly Beau had changed the way he spoke about his wife.  
If the lack of Will's presence caused a burst of affection for his wife, then his reemergence in his life cut it short. He now spoke of her as if she was... inadequate.  
Hannibal could feel the coldness in his words, as if he was disgusted by what Ella-May perceived about their son.  
The passage of emotions that were flowing from the tall, large man sitting a few feet away from him were almost disturbing.  
  
"When Will started going to school, I insisted on bringing him personally. It was not far from our home, so we would walk there and I would return alone.  
I would hold him by the hand during the journey and I remember how surprised I was, everytime, about how frail he seemed. So pale and small ...  
I know how boys can be assholes and I feared he might have some problems with the ones that were stronger when he went to the middle school ..."  
  
The man sighed crossing his legs and pressed his arms against his chest. Hannibal was silent.  
  
"So when he was eleven, in the beginning of the day, I would leave him in front of the school, calculate how many hours would have passed before their break and I went back, hiding behind the trees in the yard, just behind the gates.”  
  
The doctor opened his lips almost imperceptibly in astonishment, a personal gesture that he would easily masquerade with his usual impassibility.  
Beau's obsession with his son was worse than Hannibal imagined.  
  
"I saw all the kids go out in the yard to play ... but Will... no, not Will. He was sitting in the classroom reading.  
I was staring at him, him and his little hand that ran through his long, disordered hair ... I came back several times but that never changed.  
He was always in class, alone, to think.”  
  
Beau opened his hands on his knees and looked at his palms, flexing his fingers slowly, the tone of his voice lowering.  
  
"I told myself that it was the right time to teach him to fight to defend himself,… but I ... but I didn't. I looked at Will and I thought that he couldn't do it.  
He was...he was just so…sweet…", he said, whispering the adjective as if it were a secret.  
  
A minute of silent broke out before Beau continued.

"When he was seven, I taught him to fish, and he just kept coming with me.  
Once, we spent the weekend near an isolated pond in the woods, an hour from home. We stayed all day and in the night we slept in a tent ... "  
  
The man made a small and affectionate smile, as intense as it was disturbing.  
  
"Will fell asleep a few inches from me and...I pulled him close and held him tight, watching him sleep on my chest.  
I couldn't ... fuck, I couldn't get the thought out from my head that this wonderful creature...was made by me. That he was mine..."  
  
Beau's gaze shivered and Hannibal suddenly repressed a shudder of disgust that tried to traverse down his back.  
  
"No ... I never had anything so beautiful in my life.”  
  
Beau stood up, using the momentum with his big hands pressed against the armrests.  
Hannibal was convinced he was going to step forward, but the man just walked in front of the window, looking outside, motionless.  
The blond man sluggishly stared at his trained body, thinking of how difficult it would be to fight and restrain a man like Beau.  
Drugging him would be the only plausible option.  
While Hannibal was an experienced killer, it was obvious that Beau had lifted weights since he was very young and would be a deadly force.  
  
"I thought he would become an actor or perhaps a model ....instead ... a policeman. Who would have ever guessed that, ah.”  
  
Beau spoke with an almost seductive voice, sighing a laugh.  
As he continued to approach and then skirt away from the most central issue, Hannibal decided that it was time to stop him from talking around it.  
Beau had carefully avoided mentioning what kind of "affection" he felt about Will.  
About his perversion.  
  
"Tell me about the first boy, Mr. Graham”, Hannibal asked, with a neutral and professional voice.  
  
Beau slammed his fingers flat against his knee and then shoved his hands in the front pockets of his jeans.  
He seemed confused, the doctor could tell by the way his forehead scrunched up.  
  
"First boy...?"  
  
"Your first victim. Tell me about him.“  
  
At the word "victim" Beau's forehead relaxed like waves stretching along a pond.  
The man pressed his hand to his rough face, slowly but firmly.  
He opened his mouth as if he was about to say something, to deny something, but then he closed it.  
For a few seconds the only sound in the room was the pendulum clock's ticking.  
  
"How old was Will, Mr. Graham?"  
  
"Eleven. Eleven years old.”  
  
His deep voice rang out immediately, without delay, without any uncertainty.  
  
This admission brought a doubt and a theory into Hannibal's mind ... but he kept it carefully in a corner of his mind, in a reclusive place of his memory palace.  
  
"I was coming home from work and I saw this kid playing with a ball. I don't remember him, his voice or his face. Just..."  
  
"Just...?"  
  
Beau swallowed, his expression hardening.  
  
"I thought he looked like Will.”  
  
Hannibal watched at him, feeling his stomach turn, insatiably curious to know more, but also disgusted by the thought of what he was about to hear.  
  
"I saw him from behind, with a slender body and curly hair. He wasn't... well, as _beautiful_ as my son, but he reminded me of him. I went to him ... I don't fuckin' know why I did it. He turned around and looked in my eyes and wondered if I needed something.”  
  
The coldness and detached tone in his voice was like an Antarctic wind.  
Hannibal looked for a moment at his perfectly shined shoes and when he raised his eyes, Beau turned, looking at him carefully.  
He was testing him.  
  
"And his face became Will's... his eyes, his mouth ... his ears, his hair … I looked at him and I thought about how fuckin'... _pretty_ he was, about how much ... "  
  
Hannibal remained motionless and Beau sensed that indifference as a challenge.  
He could see no hatred, disgust or fear.  
So he continued.  
  
"... I hated him.”  
  
A grimace of anger lifted Beau's upper lip, and Hannibal noticed a small spasm traversing his face.  
  
"How much I hated that sense of need that I felt whenever he looked in my eyes, how much I hated this feeling that burned me, the desire ... that fucking desire to take and touch him, to make real what I dreamed some strange, fucked up nights. To do to him what he deserved ... "  
  
Beau abruptly breathed in, and when he went on he did it quickly, words spitting out of his mouth with hatred and poison, one after another.  
As if they were a horrible trauma, an uncomfortable memory.  
  
"Before I could restrain myself, I threw myself on him and I blocked his mouth with my hand, throwing him to the ground with the other.  
I held him firmly, holding his wrists over his head and hissing at him to stop shaking, to stop, to be silent, because he _fuckin'_ deserved it, goddamnit! He didn't have the  
right to do this to me, he didn’t!"  
  
Beau's pupils drifted into the yellow, intimate light of the abat-jour.  
  
"Then the anger confused my mind and I pulled his clothes off, I tore them off.”  
  
A frozen silence wrapped up that statement and Hannibal refused to rub his hands on his arms.  
  
"I saw Will ... I saw Will crying under me, shaking, his curly hair scattered in the grass, his eyes swollen and I thought about the power I had over him, how grateful was to see him suffer. At last he was suffering for what he was doing to me, for what he was doing to his own father ... And you know what the fuck I thought?”  
  
A slow, disturbing, sadistic smile that showed his teeth appeared, and Hannibal found himself swallowing hard.  
  
"That justice has been done.”


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, thank you keleys, for your patience and your beta job. You're a gift for this world <3
> 
> keleys blog: http://keleys.tumblr.com/

  
The following day, after his routine work schedule, Hannibal followed Beau again from a distance in a different vehicle, rented for the occasion.  
Quietly sitting in the Black Ford Mustang, scented with a dingy pine air freshener, he drove to another singles bar, this time a few miles from the one where he ﬁrst saw Beau going to.  
As the man parked his car, Hannibal lazily watched the sapling that emitted that pungent smell, tied with an elastic at the rear view mirror, continue to sway.  
  
Beau took more time to get out compared to last time, and when he did, he was again followed by a boy out of the passenger’s door .  
This boy had a much more serene expression in comparison to the last young boy that the man had met.  
This one seemed to be Will's age too, a small and slender body, with curly brown locks, and a pair of dark eyes.  
While he didn't resemble his son immensely, Beau seemed quite pleased with the similarities.  
  
Hannibal picked up a small, brass pocket binocular from the car's glovebox, setting the lenses so that he could see the pair as soon as they entered and sat in the backseats of the parked car.  
They close together, their torsos and faces turned towards one another.  
Hannibal found the entire situation rather dull, but was disgusted that the man was willing to do it in his son's car, even as he imagined he was driven by despair.  
Or maybe it was a deliberate move.  
  
Surely, the car inside smelled of Will.  
  
Beau looked at the young man's cheeks as he ran his hand on the back of his neck and shoulder, carefully avoiding his eyes.  
Hannibal thought it was because they were brown and closed-off, not the blue light that dominated Will's appearance.  
Immediately, Beau dipped his ﬁngers into his hair, glimpsing at his naked, exposed throat.  
The boy showed a mischievous smile and bit his lower lip, tilting his head back to meet his ﬁngers, ﬁnally leaning forward to kiss him.  
  
But Beau didn't take that very well.  
  
To the amazement of the psychiatrist, the man gasped as though he had been shocked by an electric current and thrust the boy offﬀviolently, banging his head against the car window.  
The young man opened his lips to groan in sorrow and surprise, and looked at the older man in horror, bursting out from the car in fear as if he had the devil on his heels.  
Will Graham's father ﬁsted at the car seat without watching him leave, a furious expression on his face and hands clenched in two trembling ﬁsts of unexpected wrath.

  
  
\---------------------

  
  
"My baby grew fast. He began to develop his empathic thing at eleven years.  
At sixteen, his body was completely developed and it was fuckin' hard."  
  
"Hard?"  
  
Beau nodded solemnly, annoyed, and with a tired expression, as if he was experiencing that memory physically.  
Hannibal looked at him as he scratched his head, sitting on the chair in front of him, and casually wondered if he had showered before he went to his studio.  
  
"Will has always been so... _beautiful. Too beautiful._ ”, he commented with such a wistful tone that he transformed those qualities into defects.  
He shook his head slowly, his eyes dark in Hannibal's ones.  
  
"You know, when I brought him to school, when we walked on the street ... when we went shopping, always ... everybody stared at him, all the time. Fuck, even the ﬂowers turned around to look at him.”  
  
Hannibal wondered if this was true.  
Of course, Will Graham was a very pretty man, but the fact that he attracted everyone's attention seemed to be overly exaggerated.  
  
"I remember that Will always kept his eyes on the ground or in front of him, never looking at anyone.”  
  
  
Beau sighed heavily, deﬂating his enormous chest and closing his eyes for a moment.  
When he opened them again, a tight smile quirked the corner of his mouth, without joy or pain: an empty gesture.  
  
"He don't realize the effect he has on people"  
  
"Which effect is that, Mr. Graham?"  
  
"Tell me ... what effect does he have on you?”  
  
Beau challenged, looking at him intently, his voice rumbling and threatening.  
When Hannibal’s only reply was his silence and boredom, Beau sighed a laugh.  
  
"It's hard to explain it, yeah?"  
  
"I'm not here to talk about me, Mr. Graham. I'm here to hear about you.“  
  
"Have you said anything to my boy?”, he asked in a slow whisper, voice growing cold, as if he was ready to jump on him if necessary.  
  
Hannibal didn't react to this veiled threat and struck an expression of sincere tranquility.  
  
"I don't think there's any need, Mr. Graham. I think that Will is already familiar with what you feel for him, considering his empathic capacity. I repeat that I am not permitted to divulge what is said in this room ... to anyone. It would be too dangerous for my professional reputation.”  
  
"Yeah ... you can’t,” Beau insisted, looking at him with malice.  
  
It was evident that he enjoyed the situation and Hannibal felt himself burning with hate and unbearable humiliation from head to toe.  
It's usually the doctor who has power over his patient, as in the case of Will Graham.  
But if the patient shares enormous and severe information, all that the psychiatrist can do is listen.  
This makes him useless.  
Because he loses all of his control over the situation.  
  
"Before I told ya that Will didn't know the effect he has on people.”  
  
Beau paused for a few seconds, ﬂuent and peaceful, as if they were discussing about the weather. He bent his legs to sit, relaxed his arms on the armchair and Hannibal foresaw the arrival of a new, burning revelation, clawing its way to his lips.  
  
"Well ... that was what I thought.”  
  
The blond man didn't encourage him to continue in any way. That was what Beau wanted.  
He let the time pass slowly, during which they looked into each other eyes, stretching it into a challenge of revelations and mutual contempt.  
When Beau began to speak again, his tone was hoarse and vaguely hypnotic, almost seductive.  
  
"One day, when Will was seventeen, he came back from school with a classmate, a tall boy with red hair. I was sitting on the couch in the trailer park where we lived with Sprinkles, our dog. He went in and told me they had a project to work on and that they would do it outside."  
  
Beau closed his eyes and his expression hardened quickly, radiating a dark aura of palpable and burning anger.  
  
"After a few minutes, I got up and looked from the window. Will was lying down on his belly, the pencil tucked in his hair.”  
  
He swallowed and Hannibal felt so much of that jealousy that it felt physical, pinching his shoulders.  
  
Beau continued, ”That boy stared at him with a blushing face and an idiotic smile on his face while Will was there laughing, with the book open in front of him. His eyes gazing into the ones of that piece of shit."  
  
His ﬁngers clenched into ﬁsts with a shiver, as strong as he was shaking and Beau released an animalistic sound out of his thin, dry lips.  
  
"It made me so pissed that I couldn’t wait anymore.”  
  
Beau's coffee colored eyes seemed to grow darker and his whole countenance was venomous.  
  
“I ran out from the door and I pulled my boy up by the arm. I screamed at that lil' shit to get the fuck away, to go fuck himself. The idiot was frightened like a pussy and he ran away, didn't stop to pick up his stuffﬀ.”  
  
Beau licked his lips nervously, as his story became more and more suffocating and intense.  
  
"Will cried out for me to leave him alone, he repeated that again and again, punching weakly on my chest. Ah, I pulled him inside the house and threw him on my bedroom ﬂoor while Sprinkles barked at me from the living room.”  
  
A furious laugh burst into the room and Hannibal wished, trying to mask his disgust and anger as best he could, to not hear the carnal excitement ﬂowing from his mouth like a violent waterfall.  
  
"Oh, he burst into tears, weeping. He knew what the fuck he had done, what the fuck he was doing , right in front of me, after all the fatigue I was under, trying to restrain myself! I didn't give a fuck, he wouldn't get away without a scratch, no! I sat on the bed and I put him on my knees ... "  
  
When he looked at Hannibal, he panted maniacally, his eyes completely black, his mind clouded.  
  
"I pulled his trousers and pants down under his legs, pulled his hair with my free hand so I could see him in the face and I give a hard slap on his naked buttocks, strong as I could.”  
  
Hannibal's nostrils dilated for the rage that was exploding, boiling and ﬂowing inside him, but Beau seemed don't notice it, lost in his vivid memory.  
  
"Will started to scream,with his face completely red and tears ﬂowing down his cheeks but oh, he deserved it, he deserved it, _fuck_! I hissed to him that _he was mine_ , that he was _mine_ and _mine_ alone, that he shouldn't act like a _little bitch_ , that he couldn't do this, that he couldn't _ruin me_ like that! I looked him in the face as I kept slapping him repeatedly, one after the other. Fuck, his cute ass became so ﬂushed and oh, how he was agitated with pain and fear from my hands. Those small, adorable sounds that were coming out of that pretty, wet mouth of his ... "  
  
"Mr. Graham ..."  
  
"I realized that I couldn't stop myself, I cannot. I have no idea how long I fucking did it, but after a while Will jerked and fell on the ground, closing into a ball with his hands covering his head, shaking like a leaf and sobbing aloud. When I looked myself, I noticed that ... "  
  
And Hannibal didn't want to hear the follow-up of that sentence, but he had to.  
  
"Well... I noticed that the thing had turned me on ... if ya know what I mean.”  
  
Suddenly all of Beau's ecstasy and emotion vanished and the panting slowly fell quiet, as did his voice. His expression was relaxed, but as the man regained his calmness, now free from the weight he had hidden for many years, Hannibal found his hands shaking a little as they were desperate for the need to kill the monster sitting in front of him.  
He had never felt such strong hate for someone as in that moment.  
It seemed to him like hot water ﬂowed through his body, quick and unstoppable, as powerful as constant ﬁreworks bursting into his burning brain.  
He imagined a submissive Will so many times, in the silence of the night and in the privacy of his own home.  
  
But not in the hands of someone who wasn't him.  
It was intolerable.  
  
“Doc?"  
  
After a while Beau asked, as if he had said nothing wrong.  
A pretend innocence that Hannibal received as a personal insult.  
  
"Do you feel sorry for what you did, Mr. Graham?”,  
  
Hannibal asked, masking all the feverish emotion behind his exotic voice, quiet and indifferent, looking at that man with eyes overwhelmed with malice.  
Beau seemed to notice it, but he didn't look bothered or alarmed at all.  
If anything he seemed even amused, satisﬁed, as if he wanted that reaction from the beginning.  
  
He gave a mockingly small, serene smile.  
  
"And why should I? Will is _my_ son.”  
  
"Do you think that this gives you the right to own him, as a piece of property?"  
  
To this, Beau darkened, without showing his teeth, but it was obvious that he was angry. Hannibal enjoyed that reaction in total secrecy.  
  
"If I thought that Will was nothing but a toy, I wouldn't restrained myself all this years from taking him and doing to him what I want ... don't you think?"  
  
He asked with incredible arrogance, as if was shocked by a such stupid question.  
  
"I love Will and in our veins ﬂow the same blood, Doc. So I decide what he can and what he cannot do.”, he ﬁnished with a loud sigh and then raised a grey eyebrow, looking at the doctor's face with superiority.  
  
"I just want the best for him, as I told ya. I don’t need excuses ... I love my son, I love him immensely. It's normal to love your own son, after all."  
  
_Of course, it's normal to love your own son_ , thought Hannibal coldly, listening to the wind that shook the trees with unprecedented power, as if even the nature was rebelling to that man.  
  
_... But not like this._


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And even this chapter was betad by the awesome keleys from tumblr: http://keleys.tumblr.com/  
> As I already told you, you've been useful, kind and patient and you saved my story.  
> Thank you very much.

  
It wouldn't take too much time anymore.  
Beau was a handsome man and Will wasn't the only boy in town with brown curly hair, blue eyes and a thin body.  
The young man's father would soon ﬁnd a substitute for his son, a guy eager to share with him a night of violent passion, unaware of being nothing but a toy to replace an incestuous, burning desire that since a long time driven Beau Graham insane.  
  
After another day of complete solitude, Beau had returned home, frustrated, entering into his son's house as it belonged to him.  
He showered, crunched some cheese-potato chips and sat down on the couch with Sugar, whose muzzle was gently resting on his feet, looking up unsurely at the strange man who smelled slightly like his master.  
  
When Will returned home, Beau was watching a television program about hunting knives and greeted him with a warm smile.  
Will went to run with the dogs, avoiding staying near his father as much as possible.  
Beau narrowed his eyes, staring at him from the door’s threshold, thoughtful.  
  
\---  
  
They dined on pre-cooked hamburgers, packaged, and heated up in the microwave.  
The boy started when the older man sat close next to him on the couch but he didn't stand up.  
They talked of mindless things like Will's dogs, ﬁshing, and food's surprising quality despite its low price.  
Beau looked at his son as he spoke, but Will shifted his eyes from the burger just to watch his sleeping animals scattered around the living room, his shoes, or to check that his father's free hand stayed on the sofa's arm.  
  
They didn't talk about Hannibal, they didn't talk about Ella-May, they didn't talk about work.  
  
Will wanted to talk to him about the past, the nightmares he had of him, wanted to ask him what he had done wrong to warrant those actions.

But he remained silent looking at that big, dangerous hand, trying to ignore the instinct of separating himself from the press of his father’s leg.

He listened to Beau's breath between one bite and the next, to check that he was still preoccupied and hoping that his hamburger had been smaller.  
  
\---  
  
Hannibal was not at the Graham's home until midnight.  
After work, he had gone to see a lyrical opera, listening in delight to the rich and passionate notes that followed the sweet singer, who was beautifully singing _"L'amour est un oiseau rebelle"_ , separating himself from the earthly world and thoughts for ﬁve, blessed minutes.  
  
When he arrived, the interior of the house was immersed in darkness, just as the night outside.  
He thought that father and son were sleeping.  
Howsoever, he picked up his expensive binoculars and looked for a few minutes, up and down.  
He had found a high part of the ground and he had situated himself so he could see better what was happening in the upper ﬂoor.  
  
Despite the expensive binocular's quality, he could only see the furniture’s shapes and Will's silhouette resting upstairs, his chest rising and falling in pace with his tired but constant breath.  
  
Just as he wondered where Beau was sleeping, the kitchen light lit up and he saw the man enter in the room with a tired expression.  
He was wearing a white shirt that showed part of his chest, with black and grey hair peaking.  
He had a pair of black jogging trousers, and his hair was mussed even more than usual, its little tips pointing in various directions.  
He had woken up in the middle of a dream and Hannibal watched him ﬁll a glass of water in the sink, with Buster who had heard and followed him with inquisitiveness.  
  
Beau merely gave him a quick caress on its little head and then turned off the light, heading upstairs.  
Hannibal watched Will's room and just a few seconds later he saw Beau's huge and black silhouette in it, moving slowly and attentively, probably barefoot.  
The psychiatrist took a moment to adjust and clean the binoculars, and when he looked up, he stared through the glass circles as Beau moved from the lamp switch, that had previously been extinguished, on the bedside.  
  
Will was absolutely delicious in his miraculously quiet sleep, his thick lashes resting on the top of his cheeks that were slightly ﬂushed and shining with warm sweat.  
His rebellious hair framed his pleasant face like clinging vines.  
  
Beau looked him from above for a while and then he bent forward, approaching so that his face hovered a scant few inches from Will’s, a single thin salt and pepper hairline sliding over his cheekbone.  
He stared at him with eyes overﬂowing with emotion, _hungry_ , like a lion would look at a single gazelle as it grazes unknowingly with his herd.  
His eyes shifted along his face as well as his own head and he watched the young body hidden with the sheet from his hips down.  
Hannibal looked while his stomach twisted at how Beau's rough ﬁngers approached the boy's chest, tilting them forward and almost touching the small, erect left nipple pressed, as was its twin, against the fabric of the white t-shirt he wore.  
  
It was clear that Beau was _starving_ , but that he was trying to settle with the sight of his hand near to his son's body.  
Beau inhaled through his nose, lightly stretching his nostrils, collecting himself, trying to find patience and restraint.  
He repeated the gesture, this time with his nose almost immersed in the spot where Will's shoulder and neck met and he carried a trembling hand between his own legs, as though Will's scent and sight were too much for him.  
  
Hannibal swallowed a grunt of sincere reproach to that image and thought that it wasn't probably the ﬁrst time that the man had give a night-time visit to the unconscious young man.  
He wondered if Will had ever discovered it in the past and how he reacted.  
  
Did Will pretend to be asleep and hope that he would go away, to look at him afraid and ask him to leave, to run away from the bed and out to the trailer park where they lived.  
Did he do it when his wife was still healthy, when his wife was sick or only after she was no longer alive.  
  
Before leaving the room, Beau took a few, full more minutes to watch Will sleep, leaning over to look at him more closely and breath in near the crown of his head.  
  
He reached his ﬁngers out to his face, bent over and almost let their noses touch, gently brushing his slightly open and wet pink lips with his ﬁngertips.  
A slow, trembling gesture, overﬂowing with passion and morbidity.  
With his eyes almost completely black, he devoured Will in the secrecy of that silent, hot night.  
  
\---  
  
"Tell me about when Will ran away.”  
  
Hannibal's voice echoed lazily and professional, as if he had been tired of the fatal game he had just started four days earlier, but that he was still in that swig of words.  
Beau was scratching the skin that surrounding the side of his thumbnail, with his eyes lost on the ﬂesh with as much apathy.  
At that question he raised his head slowly and looked at the doctor in the eyes with slight arrogance.  
  
"What makes you think that he ran away?"  
  
"You doesn't seem inclined to separate from Will, as you thinks he needs you.”  
  
"I don't think so ... it's the _truth_ , doc.”  
  
Beau's emphasis on 'think' spoke of a man with infinite arrogance, though Hannibal ignored that.  
He had grown accustomed to that crude personality.  
After seeing him say and do so many obscene things, these moments had become truly irrelevant.  
  
"Will left home a few days after his eighteenth birthday.”, the man began, leaning back to relax his neck and head.  
He dragged his open hand over his chin and then sighed roughly.  
  
"I came home from work and didn't see him. I ﬁgured that after school he was out walking, spending time ... but after a few hours I began to worry and went to look for him.”  
  
His lips sank into a very thin line and his coffee-colored eyes, as he talked, went damp.  
  
"I was looking for hours around the city, walking and then driving, but nothing.... fuck, nothing.”  
  
His mouth began to shiver and the man closed his eyes quickly, trying to contain himself.  
  
"I went back to the trailer park and then into Will's room. I opened the closet and when I saw that his clothes were gone ... "  
  
His voice trembled uncontrollably and with brutal force Beau pressed both hands on his face, bent forward in his chair, toward his knees covered with a pair of very dark, ruined jeans.  
For a few seconds, Beau's unstable breath pervaded the room and Hannibal thought that, in all his madness, Beau had suﬀered enormously at Will's escape.  
He must have felt anger, pain, frustration.  
Will had left on his own decision and while Beau could be narcissistic, he was not stupid.  
_He knew._  
  
  
"... I remember that I grabbed his three down-padded winter coats that he had left hanging, shouting at them in them with all the breath I had in my lungs. I felt so fucking ... _bad_ , that I couldn't stand and I fell to my knees, embracing his clothes "  
  
Beau released his face from the imprisonment of his own hands and his eyes were red, his cheeks glistened with tears and were slightly ﬂushed, as was his the tip of his nose.  
He swallowed a mournful groan of suffering and closed his eyes, passing his ﬁngertips just beneath his thick eyelashes, expecting a renowned ﬂow of abundant tears.  
  
"He didn't leave me anything. Not a note, not a piece of paper, nothing. Only the empty house, some of his clothes, some books, and his toothbrush. That night I had been lying on his bed, with my face pressed into his pillow, with his... _scent_ , I couldn’t sleep... hoping to hear him open the door and came in ... "  
  
His masculine voice was still mourned with tears and it had slightly raised in pitch.  
He sniffed, but when Hannibal picked up a handkerchief from his jacket's inner pocket, Beau shook his head, denying himself that luxury.  
  
"I spent the next _four years_ looking for him and hoping to see him again... every little sound made my _fuckin' heart_ drop to the ground.  
How many times I imagined hearing his footsteps, hear his voice, hear him say _daddy!_ , the sound of his backpack when he let it fall on the ﬂoor after returning from school ... "  
  
He sighed very loudly and when he looked into Hannibal’s eyes, the doctor almost felt bad for him, so intense and sincere was his suﬀering that it overwhelmed him.  
  
"Then I was arrested ... but I still tried to track him down in jail, by searching his name on the computer that was given to prisoners who kept good conduct for a whole month. A few weeks after my release ... ﬁnally, I found him.”  
  
Beau uncovered his imperfect teeth in a smile, his dark eyes shimmering slightly with bare emotion.  
  
"An article was posted on a blog about a special agent working for the FBI.  
His photograph was attached ... my heart stopped working when I saw him.”  
  
Hannibal understood that the man was talking about TattleCrime.com and if he had already felt an immense disdain for that red-haired journalist,  
Freddie Lounds had oﬃcially entered into his shopping list, her rudeness securing ﬁrst place in his future menu.  
  
"There was this picture of his face, a front shot, as if he was photographed for an identity card.  
I remember that I literally gasped, because a small part of me thought that I wouldn't see him again.  
Instead, there was this image, his face slightly covered with beard, but still... so, so _pretty and lovely_ , his gaze lost in the void ... "  
  
Hannibal imagined Beau, whispering " _baby_ " as he caressed the screen, with a policeman beside him, who was puzzled and suspicious of the scene.  
  
"I watched him for a while and I thought about how much I had missed that face, I missed my son, _my darlin_ ' ... and now, I am here.”  
  
He accompanied the phrase opening his arms, as if wanted to emphasize his presence.  
Hannibal closed his eyes and made a small, false but polite smile.  
  
“Now, me and Will are back together, we're one. And no one can ever divide us.” Beau's voice was a ﬁrm, quiet sigh, a fabric of certainty and determination.  
  
Hannibal's smile curled more and secretly became a gesture, a promise of sincere _sadistic fun._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The photo that Beau had seen was this: https://thesexythighsofthebatman.tumblr.com/post/160663571390/about-this-post-i-found-a-prettier-one-shoot .  
> It's one of my favourite Will Graham's shoot ever <3

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! <3
> 
> * You can find me on Tumblr! For questions, chatting or everything else! : https://thesexythighsofthebatman.tumblr.com/ *


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